In a multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) technology, channel fading is suppressed by using a multiple-antenna technology in a base station and user equipment, so that a channel capacity, a network coverage area, and spectrum usage can be greatly improved. The MIMO technology includes a multi-user multiple-input multiple-output MU-MIMO technology and a single user multiple-input multiple-output (SU-MIMO) technology. For the MU-MIMO technology, the user equipment (UE) feeds back measured downlink channel information to the base station, and the base station selects, based on a scheduling policy, suitable UE for pairing. The base station performs, on a same communication resource, data transmission with UEs that are successfully paired.
In the prior art, for the MU-MIMO, due to interference between paired UEs and overheads of measurement pilots, system performance of the MU-MIMO is not significantly improved relative to the SU-MIMO.